Gray
by MiscellaneousAilurophileOfFire
Summary: Because she doesn't know where she is, who she is, why she is here, and why there are voices talking in her head. OC
1. Chapter 1

_Quicksilver_

_Summary: Just thinking about her memories made her head hurt; What more could she ask for? OC _

_A/N: Heyyy! I've decided to polish my li'l story a little more, and repost the entire thing. So now, we start with a vaguely new OC that has some of the same aspects as before, but really, I intend to take an entirely new approach at this. So yeah, this was originally another story that I took down, but I rewrote it and this came out._

_Eh, I'm very free at the moment, my exams have finished, and the teachers are making us stew for a month until we get our super-duper-important results. Honestly, I think they're secretly cackling evilly at us somewhere else. It is a conspiracy I say, a conspiracy! XDDD Anyway, here's the prologue for my story, and it starts off with my OC's father's pov, so yeah. Don't expect my OC to come along until the later part of the story. _

_For some reason, my hamster seems to be really weird. It starts getting up at dawn and runs around its wheel throughout the day and sleeps at night. I thought hamsters were nocturnal but Meow seems to be a weird hamster._

_Eh, onwards!_

_Disclaimer: I'm only doing one of these per story to save people time from reading over and over again. I'll add another one if something or someone is not owned by me. Naruto is owned my Masashi Kishimoto, I'm just a bum here, writing stories about his characters._

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><p>Hyuuga Hiashi had seen a lot of babies in his lifetime- Whether they were from the Branch house of his, or from the other clan head's boasting about their mini-doppelgangers at the monthly clan council meeting, he had never ever encountered a child as disconcerting as his.<p>

Pride and affection for his wife had swelled in his heart when he saw her carrying their child in her arms, smiling tiredly at him when the tedious process of child-birthing was over. Their child, whom they had named Hyuuga Hai, was also relatively quiet.

The next few weeks for them were like a dream- Something that they had barely remembered and left dazed when the following days after that few weeks came. The quiet child of his drastically changed into something completely different, its cause he could not fathom.

Hai cried and cried, her tiny fists beating the sides of her crib where she slept and played, the high wails well continuing into the night. She had kept that up for a few weeks, screaming and crying despite the frantic efforts of his wife to calm the child down.

Doctors had dubbed it as 'colic', telling the frantic parents that it was perfectly normal for the child to scream as Hai did, and that she would calm down and proceed on with life after a month or so.

But it didn't stop.

Hai continued to wail at the top of her lungs, flailing her legs around weakly and smashing her fists into the bamboo used to make the crib. She didn't stop at night, only sleeping for a few hours at a time, waking up her parents during their well-needed rest.

Hiashi often woke up to the sight of his wife rocking the crib gently, whispering soft words to their daughter, soothing their daughter to sleep. It would last well to the early morning, when his exhausted wife would fall asleep on the crib, and the whimpers of his daughter would die down to a few small snores as they slept.

The troublesome problem (damn that Nara for influencing his choice of words, not that he would ever say that to the face of that man though,) of his daughter still remained as the weeks slowly turned into months. Another alarming problem had come, Hai started to bang her head repeatedly when she cried the loudest, startling and worrying her parents.

The doctors they had in the clan couldn't help the weary family of three- So Hiashi resorted to asking for medics at the hospital to come and take a look at their child in the privacy of their home.

He had tried to keep it a private affair; His pride and his ego would never have allowed him to leak this news of a weak Hyuuga heir to the others. It would be a stupid move, as well as a risky one. Assassins could take the weakness of his child and use it against her, and inevitably, she would get killed.

But those medics that could be bought into silence weren't enough. They had failed again and again, failing to diagnose the condition of the Hyuuga heir, of _his child. _His wife hadn't spoken much during the entire two weeks before he had caved in. The slightly red rimmed eyes and the exhausted wrinkles on her face after spending sleepless nights with Hai had been apparent to him, even without the aid of his Byakugan.

And then he caved in. Each passing day knowing that perhaps, _just perhaps, _the medics could find a way to help his daughter and they could go back to the short period of time when all had been peaceful and calm after Hai had been born. The rumours would be worth it too- If it helped his daughter and wife, he would do anything for them.

The medics couldn't help much. They could only tell Hiashi that something was bothering their child and it wasn't a problem that was caused by chakra. It was something else- Something that no one could identify that secretly terrified Hiashi.

Worse of all, it aggravated the problem. When Hiashi took a walk to survey his clan members, he could feel and see the awkward stares and the quiet sneering at him for producing such a weak child. When he ventured outside, the situation was not much different. The medics, just like he predicted, had spread the news that the Hyuuga heir would simply not stop crying, would not stop hurting, and would never grow up to be an exemplary shinobi.

Hiashi was beginning to feel tired of this child's wailing, and the problems that his clan had were also beginning to take a toll on him. Sometimes, he stared into the dark, inky blackness of the night scenery outside his office, and wondered if putting his daughter out of her pain would be a good thing to do. This occasion was not a foreign one today.

He glanced slowly at the infant a few meters away- Her face flushed white, the grimy tear tracks that ended just a centimetre below her eyes where it had been hastily wiped away, her fists clenched tightly and the soft whimper of her voice.

Staring at his daughter for a few more moments, he tore his gaze away, his deep breaths turning into shallow inhales of air. Frustration and worry ate away at his mind, and he unconsciously clenched, then unclench his fists.

His daughter was in pain, and nothing could help her. Was he to let his child grow up, feeling this unknown pain for the rest of her life? Would she be crippled by this unknown pain, and- _Just exactly how much was it hurting her? _The chilling thoughts ran through his mind, in an endless repetition. He wondered briefly, indulging in the thought of killing- of putting his child out of her misery, and tried to think of what his wife would do.

His heart heavy with unseen emotions, he took a kunai and slowly pressed it into his heavy wooden worktable- An irritating habit that he displayed when a troublesome or particularly worrisome problem was bothering him. The deep gashes in wood weren't few, but none of them were as deep as the one he had made, save for one or two.

The tumultuous thoughts plagued his mind for the rest of time he was there. Feeling his heart sink deeper into a dark abyss, he made his decision. Pressure, fear and worry clouded his thoughts, and all he did was to stagger slowly to the crib where Hai had scrunched up her face in a grimace, whimpering softly.

He stared at her face for one more moment- And guilt welled up. He wouldn't let his child suffer. No, he would never let her suffer like that. He was doing her a favour.

He stilled his shaking hand, and slowly brought it thirty centimetres above Hai's head, trying to calm his frantic heart and still his heartbeat.

Bringing the kunai down, he- in a moment of weakness that he would never have allowed on any other day than this one- squeezed his eyes shut and pushed it down.

The blood that was supposed to splash onto his didn't come.

A warm, callused hand guided the kunai away from his child's head, and he immediately looked for the source of warmth. A masked shinobi smiled grimly at him, and spoke in a gravelly voice, "Don't. You'll regret it, this phase would pass and she'll get better. Don't throw away your daughter's life so easily."

And then the shinobi was gone.

Feeling faint, something that Hiashi hated, he sank to his knees, and stared at the kunai, and then at Hai. Crushing emotions well up in what he would call a weak display, but for once, he didn't try to suppress it. He kneeled there, as if praying to some deity; maybe he was after all, wondering about _what he had been doing._

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><p>Hisana didn't know what to do. She had been raised as a kunoichi inside the Hyuuga clan, a branch member born to a civilian father and a kunoichi mother. She, like her mother, had been branded with the Caged Bird seal that branch members bore at the age of three, effectively reducing the chance of her ever making it to Jounin.<p>

Her father- Daien- had married into the Hyuuga family through an arranged marriage with her mother- Kanei. Daichi had come from a wealthy merchant family that dabbled in trading and the occasional shipping service, and the Hyuuga clan in a bid to gain some allies, had proposed an arranged marriage between one of their best branch members and the son of that merchant family.

Kanei couldn't refuse the clan head, or it would mean death for her. Great resentment and anger for the clan grew and hissed inside her, but she never exposed this side to anyone but her daughter Hisana. Kanei hated the unfairness of it all, and hated her husband.

He was a coward who knew that he couldn't physically overpower her, using words and actions to shame her, to degrade Kanei. Kanei knew she couldn't retaliate, the clan head would hear about it and Kanei would suffer again.

Hisana was conceived by Kanei on orders by the clan head so that the tie between both families would become stronger, an order that entirely ignored Kanei's protests and objections to have a child with that abomination that she hated so much.

Kanei often told Hisana that she had expected herself to hate her own child, but couldn't because of the bright sparkling eyes that reminded Kanei of her real lover that had been killed. Kanei would hold Hisana close and whisper to her to never become an abusive person like Hisana's father- Hisana had to be gentle, but also adamant in her own rights and freedom.

After a long 14 years of forced marriage, spats and abuse, Kanei finally snapped. She killed Daien in a fit of anger, and mortified by what she had done, hung herself and made a tale about missing nin attacking them to protect her daughter.

Hisana had returned from a long mission, only to hear her mother tell her to never give up on her dreams, to be a gentle person that cared, before her mother hung herself and ended her life.

The clan head hadn't been sympathetic- He wasn't concerned with Hisana at all. He only lamented for the loss of the bond that tied the merchant family with theirs. Hisana had sat in a pool of her parents' blood, softly crying.

All the other branch members told her to suck it up, to lock it away, to never display this weak emotion in front of anyone else again. It was _shameful, _and crying only made Hisana _weaker. _

Furious at the corrupt system, Hisana was determined to prove that she could be as good as any other main house member. She trained day and night, studying hard for medical ninjutsu while making up her own techniques deviating from the Gentle Fist Style. She also dabbled in poisons, learning about the different types that could stop all neuro-activity or disabled one's senses.

She quickly rose to Jounin, and then entertained a brief stint in AnBu, before quitting. She was finally happy for once in many years, and wanted to find a lover.

It seemed as if fate hated her, because the clan head had noticed her potential and thought that the future Hyuuga heir wouldn't go wrong if his eldest son and Hisana got married.

And so her life was determined again.

Fear that had dwelled in her heart for many years stirred and bubbled, she was afraid that she would end up like her mother. A part of her inside also rebelled at the thought of her life being determined _again, _and she loathed it.

But Hiashi's awkward advances while being stiff and upright was cute, the subtle hints that spoke volumes to Hisana about his feelings weren't unnoticed, and frankly, Hisana thought that it was endearing.

Not so reluctant about being married after all, Hisana settled down and conceived a child. A secret desire of hers was to ensure that her child wouldn't grow up lonely like she did, and wanted many more children than only a single one.

So when Hyuuga Hai had been born- A tiny thing that didn't cry and only stared and yawned dazedly at her when she fumbled with Hai- Hisana made up her mind to at least conceive a sibling for Hai.

But then the worry came. Hai cried and cried after the first two weeks- Something that the doctors could not explain when it had passed the point of Hai screaming and banging her head on the crib.

Hisana worried that she had done something wrong- That something had caused her quiet baby to cry and cry, to live in plain misery.

She was at a lost for what to do. Her mind began to sink deeply into depression, and her health started to fail. She worried for her baby, and the stress had begun to take its hold on her.

Hisana just didn't know what to do.

So until one day, where she saw her husband, Hiashi, kneel in silence beside the crib, with a kunai sitting loosely on his lap, crying softly at their child, the depression seemed to break.

It broke like shards of glass, and new resolve to keep the family together replaced all those years of hatred and fear inside her.

She vowed to keep them together, to give Hiashi and Hai what they needed, to make sure that Hai and her future children wouldn't grow up as broken to her.

Sitting quietly next to Hiashi as she gently picked Hai from her crib, she listened to him murmur a soft confession of what he was about to do. She sighed softly inside her mind, pulled Hiashi closer to her, and smiled sadly.

The pieces her family was in was jagged, but with time, it would heal and become a whole again.

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><p>"<em>Hai… Hyuuga…" <em>

Hai blinked slowly, pausing halfway when she lifted her finger to flip the pages of an interesting book she deemed good enough to read, her small fingers hovering slightly. Turning around in confusion, she scanned the room and its occupants- Only her kaa-chan was there besides her, sitting next to the table- determined to find the voice that couldn't be her kaa-chan's.

Hisana seemed to be aware of her daughter's strange actions, and asked Hai gently if anything was wrong.

"Does kaa-chan hear something?" Hai asked her mother, her silver Hyuuga eyes darting around, looking for any hints that would reveal someone else hiding from her.

Hisana shook her head, replying, "It's probably the people outside training, Hai."

Hai accepted the explanation hesitantly, though a slight sliver of suspicion arose in her mind, and continued to read the lengthy book detailing animals and various summoning contracts that had been notably seen or used.

"_Hai, can you hear us? Can you hear me?"_

Hai paused again, and slowly put the book on the floor, flinching when the voice spoke to her once more.

"_Others can't hear me. I'm in your mind, Hai. Try to speak to me in your mind- Form your thoughts but don't speak it out loud, speak it inside here." _

Devoid of any other thought by then, Hai tried a hesitant 'Hello', and deflated when she could hear her own voice. Looking back up, determined not to fail and her curiosity bursting out, Hai tried again, and found that she could say it inside.

_Hello. Who are you? _

"_I don't know. But there are others like me-" _

"**Nice meeting you! Like she said, we don't have names, but we're pretty different from one another. There's probably more in here, and I can sense them." **

_I see. _

Completely absorbed in talking to these newfound people inside her mind, Hai would have missed a slightly bewildered look that her mother shot her, had one of _them _told her about it.

"Kaa-chan? Is there something wrong?" Hai inquired, inching over slightly towards her mother so that she could press up against Hisana, snuggling into her and appreciating her warm body heat.

Hisana smiled, and gently tapped Hai's nose. "Silly Hai, there's nothing wrong." Hai grinned at her, and picked up her book, hoping that Hisana wouldn't notice anything different while she was talking to the people in her head.

"_We're not people, Hai. I don't know what we are, but we have voices, and are sentient." _

Hai was quiet for a while, before replying inside her head. A warm blue tingling inside her when that voice spoke inside her.

**Yeah, I don't actually know what I am. But… I think our purpose here is to help you through something. Don't be afraid to ask advice from us, Hai! **

The seemingly brusque voice inside her also piped up, and a fiery red flashed inside her mind. A sense of delight rippled through her, as she realized that she could differentiate between these two voices.

_Is… that so? I can feel colours when you talk to me, so I shall call you Blue, and Red. My name is Hyuuga Hai, just in case you didn't know. _

Her reply made her receive a good natured snort from Red, and a sigh from Blue. Grinning slightly to herself, she pondered on the multitude of questions to ask them.

The colours, as Hai dubbed them, were very useful people to have around. She could ask silly questions that would undoubtedly be very stupid of her to ask in public, and the opinions of the colours would help her. The privacy and secrecy of it also appealed to her, because she couldn't very much share the things that she saw to her parents.

The flashing images of people that she had never met before, but just _knew their names and what they would do and when they would die or when they would fall in love or when, just simply when they turned crazy from grief to slowly kill Konoha from its very roots. _

Her head had hurt painfully when these images flashed into her mind, nonstop ever since a few weeks after she was born. It was a haze of images and words and voices that she didn't recognise, which bore into her young brain like tree roots.

The pain was so searing, so painful that it had just melded into one thought for her young mind then- Just a simple train of _hurthurthurtshurtswhyisithurtinghurtshurthurt._

She had tried everything then- She smashed her head on the crib, relishing in the precious few seconds of disorientation that distracted her from the ever-present pain that sparked and sizzled inside her. How pressing onto previous bruises gave her a sharp, but not as intense, pain as it took her mind off the ache inside her mind.

She could briefly remember her mother taking her down, crying softly as she stared at Hai, tears dropping and tickling Hai's nose, while her mother slung the other arm around her father.

After that, the pain dulled, but was still there- still a part of her. The sessions didn't get as painful, and when it did, it rarely lasted for as long as it did when she was younger.

Slowly, she grew into a three year old child, and had been thinking whether she was insane or not- A completely different set of pictures and clips flickered through her mind- One that had people surrounding her, labs, needles, syringes. One that scared her slightly more than the weird shinobi that popped up in her mind.

_May… I ask you something? _

"_Go ahead, child." _

_Can you see my memories? Do you know why they are so… weird? _

**Hai, you're not normal. Do you see anyone else acting like you do? Do you see yourself in those memories? **

Hai furrowed her eyebrows, staring blankly at the page in front of her, her breath slightly hitching. All those memories that she saw, that played out in front of her like a movie. Had she saw herself inside the memories? Were there any Hyuuga Hais? All she knew was that a girl called Hinata would be born a few years later.

What did that mean? Was she really a-

_Am I a mistake? Am I not supposed to be here? _

Red sighed, a depressed huff coming from him.

**Yes, you aren't in the original scene. You weren't supposed to be borned, but somehow you're here. We can only deduce that something, or someone sent you here, for an unknown purpose. But you have a purpose, child. Your thoughts are way beyond what one would call mature at your age, and it resembles an adult's, if not a teenager turning into an adult. **

"_You can help those who are here, with your knowledge. We know little of it, but what I know is that Konoha will not be safe sometime now, or sometime after. There will be people who would help you with these memories, people that can protect you and teach you. I don't know who they are, but I have vague impressions of them. They will leave signs for you, so don't worry about them." _

Hai's breathing slowed down to its normal pace, being reassured that she wasn't a mistake was like a comfort blanket on her. Suddenly, a warm, slightly calloused hand was on her head, and rubbing it soothingly.

Hisana grinned at her. "Try not to think so much Hai. I can almost see your brain being frazzled."

Hai squawked, and batted the hand away, but the corners of her mouth were upturned into a small smile.

Right now, in the comfort of her room and next to her mother, being three and seeing terrifying images wouldn't be so bad.

* * *

><p>"Not now!" Hai flinched, the harsh hiss erupting from her mother sudden, shocking Hai into a well-known reaction whenever something startled her.<p>

She looked up from the book she had been quietly reading and absently jolting down comments on in the vicinity of her parents, staring blankly at the two of them.

Hisana pulled her into a fierce hug, pulling Hai onto her lap and growled slightly at her father.

"She isn't ready for this! Hai's only three, 'Shi, you know damn well she can't be a ninja at this age," Hisana growled out, calling Hiashi by a name she only used when she was furious, "Oh kami, she can't even walk well, the doctors told us about that too." Hisana's growl dropped to a mortified whisper, her hands clenched into white-knuckled fists.

Hai shut her eyes, her fingers snapping into a steady rhythm by her side.

Her head hadn't just hurt from young- Her body had been like a stiff puppet, her movements jerky and uncoordinated. When others ran, laughing and sprinting, Hai was left in their wake, her body unable to move its joints well.

The doctor had said that it had been caused by the odd position she had adopted while she was still a foetus, and it would fade eventually with time and therapy. But right now, at age three, she was as stiff as she had always been in this lifetime- If not stiffer.

It had never actually hindered Hai, she spent hours and hours in one position, never noticing the sore muscles that ached when she sat upright when reading a book that particularly engrossed her, and she didn't do much physical training- It only started when the inheritance ceremony customary to the heirs of the Hyuuga clan was over and done with.

Now that it had been brought up to her, Hai recounted a full three years of memories that started with her falling over and over again when she tried to stand- Her limbs didn't move fast enough to upright her, or when she couldn't move out of the way in time when an adult didn't see her and ploughed towards her.

Hai had always accounted that to the lack of coordination and muscle development at her young age, and being too young for her to be conscious when the doctor actually said that didn't help matters much.

Now that it had been brought up- Newfound terror ripped at her heart. She couldn't protect herself fast enough from any enemy nin, or run away from enemies, or do anything physically related fast enough. She had absolutely no solution to this new mind-boggling problem of hers, and the lack of knowledge for something in a world she knew a lot about terrified her.

This unwelcome sensation rippled through her body, a mixture of ice and fire prickling at her skin- Much like dying except toned down a great deal. Now, if she could just solve this problem, she would survive and not go through the painful ordeal of death-

Her father sighed, tearing her mind away from the distracting train of thoughts that were running rampant inside her head.

"Hisana, it could help her mobility and make her body normal again, I want Hai to be able to walk normally. She could use chakra to enhance her body till it functions normally like others do."

Hisana seem to shrink back into her body, no longer the overprotective tiger over her cub, seeming like a tired woman, decades painting itself on her weary and pained face.

"But she's so young… You know what sandaime-sama does to children who activate their chakra young right?" She whispered, her voice broken and deathly soft. Her face had paled into a colour resembling paper-white, a colour that Hai was morbidly fascinated with.

Hiashi, _father, _also seemed to age, his wrinkles growing deeper despite being a young prominent shinobi of twenty three years.

"Kaa-chan, what is chakra?" Hai asked hesitantly, slightly afraid of this foreign substance that her parent spoke of with a slight gleam at their eyes, one that also made their eyes lose all their light. She had heard about it before- The life giving energy inside all things alive had been spoken in detail once or twice during her memories, and also briefly mentioned by some of the members inside the clan.

Hiashi glanced over at Hisana, whose hands had started to shake slightly. She cradled her head with one hand, the other still firmly around Hai's waist, contemplating something which Hai thought that must affect her future.

Slowly, Hisana's head nodded, twice in resignation and hesitation. The third held a slight tinge of sadness, as if Hai was going to be doomed by her decision.

Hiashi saw his wife's go-ahead, and took a moment to reassure himself.

_It's going to either help me, or get me killed isn't it? _

**It's something volatile, Hai. It's something you should master if you want to protect your life, but we should probably keep a low profile and not show too much of our skills to others- We'll get put onto the battlefield and die much faster.**

"_Yes. You must take this chakra seriously, because it kills and heals- A balance between both sides."_

"Reach inside of yourself, and try to draw out the warmth." Hiashi finally said, his voice back to being stern and deep.

Hai nodded slightly, having pulled herself from her mother's grasp and into a position standing up and facing her father, focusing on finding the warmth inside her.

It was easily found- A deep thrum within her that flowed like water inside her veins. Focusing on expelling it from her- She tried to push chakra from her veins outside, her brows scrunched and her cheeks pushing out, she succeeded.

Completely disregarding the slight explosion, or course.

The chakra shot out of her, and immediately she tumbled to the floor, knocked from her feet. Hai gasped, inhaling a huge amount of air as her lungs seemed to cave in from her effort.

The chakra that had been expelled collided into objects that decorated the room- A few flower vases and one of the chairs inside, knocking them down too.

"S-sorry." Hai said, a sheepish giggle escaping from her lips.

Hisana grinned, and scooted over to congratulate and tease her daughter, cooing in a motherly fashion about what a cutie Hai was when she puffed out her cheeks.

Hiashi's silvery eyes also carried a tint of amusement at his daughter's antics, but sobered after a few precious moments to behave like a clan head should behave.

But the warm glow that emanated from Hai's parents didn't fade for a long time, and that night, Hai slept with a fond smile, hoping that her parents would always smile and laugh like that.

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><p><em>Omake:<em>

Hisana glanced at her daughter from the corner of her eye, vaguely registering that her daughter had paused on a page.

Scrutinising the page, Hisana briefly read it, and immediately, the thoughts of doom started invading her mind.

_Oh god, was that really a page on animal reproduction organs? _Her daughter shouldn't be interested in those at her tender age of three right?

Hai _wouldn't _be interested in those till well, perhaps sixteen, but right now, Hisana wouldn't allow it.

"Hai, please do not… go anywhere strange with a person till you're the age of sixteen, alright?" Hisana said solemnly to her daughter.

Hai nodded obediently. _Is my mother really trying to subtly hint to me to not go out? _Hai noted with a note of bemusement.

_Does she know that I had an intimate partner before this life? _


	2. Chapter 2

_Title: Flash of Grey_

_Summary: __Finding out that she was born into a completely foreign world was horrible, but finding out that there were a hundred others like her simply blew her mind. OC_

_This chapter has some mentions of death and suicide._

_A/N: Heyyyy! This chapter is about a few hundred words more than the first one, and wow. Just wow. Hai goes through some very confusing emotions and I kind of feel sad for her._

_On another note though, I've just finished watch the Hobbit and Lord of the Ring movies and I'm currently –I don't think I could call it obsessed- very interested in the fandom. I'm currently reading one that starts off as a humorous one and eventually turns into this angsty pile of feels that is very, very well-written. Ah, Thorin and his majestic majesty! (Those who have read The Skipper would very well know this phrase, and I'm referring to that.) _

_As of this date that I'm typing up this author note, I'll get my results soon and I don't really know what to feel. This examination is very important yet I feel empty inside, and am trying to feel nervous._

_Perhaps this is a genetic deficiency, curse you parents! (I'm joking; my parents are actually quite cool.)_

_Onwards! _

* * *

><p><em>2 months before the IC<em>

Hai felt like curling up into a ball and sleeping.

For the past few weeks, Hai had been reading non-stop and perfecting her chakra control. Hiashi had told her to start her chakra control exercises, with the very basic exercise of spreading chakra onto a leaf and sticking it onto her hand.

Hai had tried once, making the beginner mistake of pouring too much chakra into it. The results, however, was fairly interesting. The leaf, a dusty shade of green, grew bigger and turned into a brighter, healthier shade of green before spontaneously combusting.

She had been careful of pouring chakra into it- Only scraping off the top bit of what felt like her chakra tank and then injecting it into the leaf, knowing very well that leaves tend to make a mess when exploded, especially when you pour too much chakra into it and it becomes many more tiny pieces.

Hai took a moment to wonder what happened. Running through her memories of this world that had sharpened into memories clearer than ever before, she arrived briefly at one that someone called Yamato had explained it to another someone that was called Naruto, both people whom she had never seen before.

Still slightly confused, Hai dedicated a whole afternoon to looking up chakra at the library, and felt slightly better when she read a passage on the balance of Yin and Yang chakra.

She concluded that what she must have done was to use the Yin part of her chakra to 'heal' the leaf, and then the Yang part made it combust.

Yin chakra was often used in medical treatment; it sped up the healing process of cells and made the object significantly healthier than before when wounded. Yang chakra resembled vitality- It was like the fuel of a fire; the power.

Sitting in the corner of her bare room, one hand snapping and the other hand drumming on the floor, she went over the passages she had read, and deduced that she must have had a higher percentage of Yin chakra than Yang chakra.

It was like she had used a one percent of a hundred and fifty percent Yin chakra, compared to the one percent of her hundred percent Yang chakra.

In other terms, when she used her chakra on the leaf, the extra half percent of yin chakra mixed with one percent yang and yin chakra was used first- making the small leaf heal and grow, before the other chakra overwhelmed the leaf's cells and made them burst with an overdose of chakra, thus making it explode.

Feeling particularly satisfied at having solved her first problem, Hai wondered briefly whether consciously drawing out equal parts of her chakra would work.

Focusing on her chakra, Hai shut her eyes and tried to draw out equal parts of her chakra, before moulding it into something liquid-like and covering the leaf with it. She cracked her eyes open and looked at the leaf; Or at least what remained of the leaf. It had failed, the leaf had combusted again.

The feeling of frustration faded away when after many more, numerous attempts at spreading her chakra over the leaf, it finally stuck on her finger.

(Although the leaf did grow a bit bigger in size, and only stuck on her finger for about three seconds, Hai considered it an achievement to feel proud of and quietly crow in joy to Red and Blue which they replied in a good-natured snort and congratulations respectively.)

And slowly, maybe perhaps another week or so added to her three previous weeks spent on figuring out what the problem was and the temporary solution to solving it, her control grew to the point that she could stick a leaf on a few strands of her hair for as long as she wanted.

Her father, pleased at her slightly-improved chakra control ability, promptly set her off onto the seemingly-impossible task of walking on trees.

"That uncivilized barbarian." Hai huffed to her grinning mother, after a long session of discreet complaining.

"Well said, Hai." Hisana laughed, a wicked grin forming on her face as she thought of Hiashi prancing about in loin cloths and grunting out some mono-syllables.

Turning to her daughter who had a small smile on her face, Hisana spoke with a tone of seriousness after perhaps a minute or so laughing at her daughter's plight, "Your father is right, you should do those exercises. Can't help you much." Hisana shrugged, the devious smile appearing again at the sight of her daughter's slumped shoulders.

"That's just mean," Hai groaned in defeat, and slumped even further when her mother replied.

"Aw, love you too."

* * *

><p><em>...<em>

Hiashi strode into his daughter's room, expecting her to be quietly reading a book like she always does.

A faint, deep purple swirled around a leaf, instantly making it larger than it originally was, and sticking onto his daughter's fingernail, stubbornly refusing gravity.

It took a moment for him to comprehend it, but when it clicked, a warmth spread through his body as he quietly walked away.

A later time that day, he saw Hai in their own personal training ground, trying to stick herself on the wood bark of a tree, unsuccessfully doing so for about thirteen attempts before she stuck solidly on the tree bark without falling off for five seconds.

Ignoring the slightly healthier state of how the tree became when she fell down after her one successful attempt, Hiashi wondered if this stubborn streak in his daughter came from him.

Shaking his head ever so slightly, and a fond smile tugging itself on his lips, he knows it wouldn't have been inherited from him- Hisana was always the wild, unyielding one, a person he loved dearly to his very core, despite the reservations he had at first when meeting her.

The day would fade into the golden sunset, the hue of brilliant red, hazy yellow and bright orange swirling together, after slowly giving way to purple and deep, deep blue, just like how his daughter's chakra was, and Hiashi would be left with the gentle night.

And just like many others, Hiashi wouldn't see his daughter's small shoulders shake ever-so-slightly, never see the spark of fear in her silver-coloured eyes, never notice the terrified confusion covering her eyes like the haze, and above all, never feel the deep fear and confusion and anger and mystery kill his daughter inside, pricking her like senbon that would draw blood.

* * *

><p><em>...<em>

"_It's okay Hai, just go to sleep. Perhaps," _Blue said with a hint of uncertainty and wavered, "_perhaps the dreams won't come today." _

Hai would try to focus on Blue's voice, trying to concentrate on the calm of her colours, trying valiantly to ignore the images of dead shinobi, of limbs severed and maniacs laughing, sneering at her, at people crying, all from some memories she had inside her head.

It didn't work like always, but the thought of trying and perhaps succeeding was so tantalizing that Hai tried every time, wishing for her sleep to be dreamless and not filled with bloody images of some time that she didn't know.

Red would butt into their conversation by now, despite the many disapproving chidings by Blue to inform him that suddenly cutting off conversation was very rude, Hai was appreciative of his outbursts, it dragged her mind away from the subject at hand.

**Argh, sorry I haven't been able to talked to you for a while. It's just that-**

Red cut off, and an uneasy silence fell over them. Hai waited for Red to continue patiently, hoping that her sleep would be put off for a bit more.

"_-We've been fighting," _Blue said smoothly, picking up Red's conversation, "_That idiot doesn't want to admit that you talk to me more." _

**Hey!**

Snickering slightly, Hai could almost see Blue smirking at Red while Red glowered angrily at Blue.

_Don't worry, I love you all equally._

Ignoring Red's splutter at her blatant love for both of them, Hai wriggled into her covers, burrowing into the covers and shutting her eyes, in desperate hope that perhaps the memories in her dreams wouldn't be as bloody as the last night's.

__: Flashes of kunai, landing into the wood. The soft thumps, three in rapid succession, could be heard. _

_Soft laughter erupts, and Hai whirls around from where she had been standing in this dreamworld to see a young boy, laughing at a glowering toddler. _

"_You'll land the kunai into the wood like I do soon, Sasuke. It's all just a matter of time and practice." The older male, deep crinkles of fear and exhaustion etch themselves into his face, but despite that, a fond smile tugs at his originally stony face. _

"_But Ita-nii! 'Tou-sama never praises me like he does to you. Not even when I land the kunai where you did." The toddler says sullenly, huffing and pouting in a childish way that only children could do. _

_His attempted glare made Hai smile slightly; this 'Sasuke' was indeed spirited. _

_Turning away from them, Hai wandered towards a pond not so far away from the duo, and stared at her reflection for a moment. _

_This time, her hair was long and braided, her body tall and lithe, and it resembled one of a kunoichi's. Her fingers were thin, but the callouses on the palms and on her fingers, seemingly gained from frequently holding kunai and shuriken were apparent. Her clothing too, similar to that of a Hyuuga's yet also vastly different hung off her frame. _

_Something caught her eye; The black, spider web marks were not there from her previous memory- They spanned the length of her arms, extending to her elbows and ending at the wrist. A similar network of marks branched out into her side, marring her scarred skin. _

_And it hurt. It hurt like her memories did, a burning sensation, yet icy frost, ran wild through the areas, more intense than her memories did, spreading like wildfire through her veins. Every time she tried to touch the marks, it glowed slightly, and the pain grew threefold. The markings stretched out wider when she touched them, flaming and burning and piercing. _

_Hai gave up trying to do anything about them, and instead, watched the memories unfold. _

_The scene had changed. _

_It was no longer a tranquil garden that surrounded the pair of brothers that squabbled, it changed into a raging river, and the sensation of pelting rain hitting her skin._

_She quietly watched on, trying to pull on her dreamworld's clothes more onto her body to block out as much of the icy rain as possible._

_Staring at the same older boy, 'Ita-nii', converse quietly to another similar-looking boy, with the same dark eyes and hair, Hai mentally catalogued this pair into her mind. This other male didn't have the same stress marks, his creases spoke of laughter and smiles, yet the eyes that should have been bright was dulled by a sadness._

"_I understand, Itachi. Save your brother; This fate I have is unavoidable. I can only hope that something will come out of this affair. I won't begrudge you, for your burden is heavier than everyone here. I only wish that perhaps, I could say goodbye to my family and friends. You will always be my cousin, if not a little brother to me." With a wistful smile shared between this male and 'Itachi', this male plunged himself into the kunai that 'Itachi' held in front of him._

_Hai shut her eyes momentarily, feeling the heavy cloak of sadness and anger drape itself upon her, feeling another stone thrown into her already weighted heart. _

_Another death, another loss, and another bloody ending. These memories were inside her, for a reason she could not understand, showing people that she did not know, or did not meet before. _

_Why was this being played out to her? Hai wondered, as she cracked her eyes open again, surely something must have been done so that the purpose in these memories would be apparent to her. When was it going to show? These deaths and memories were much clearer than before, yet so much darker than she had ever anticipated._

_This Itachi now, spoke a few words before silently leaving the place. As Hai saw him leave, the black of his red-tinted eyes had grown, as well as the sorrow deep within its depths. _

_Perhaps, just perhaps, Itachi had felt the same amount of sorrow as Hai did, when Shisui died. _

_For his last words were, "Your death will not be wasted, Shisui, you will live on through me." _

_And then, the light that filtered through her window would hit her, and she would open her eyes. :__

* * *

><p>...<p>

Hai woke up to the sensation of deft fingers combing through her messy mane of lime green hair, the faint tugging stirring her from her dream-plagued sleep.

Giving her beaming mother a sleepy, half-lidded stare, Hai raised her head for a moment before she dropped it back onto her pillow, snuggling into her covers deeper. Hearing her mother's laughter, Hai tried to ignore it and hide underneath her covers.

"Kaa-chan," Hai eventually said drowsily, poking her head out from her covers, "What did I do-"

"Or will do, my child."

"-Or will do, to have you grace my lowly bedroom and do my unworthy hair?" Hai amended, giving a small yawn as she crawled out of the covers and landed with an undignified thump on the floor.

Hisana smiled at her child. "Oh nothing, I just needed a little practice with braiding hair. Have I mentioned that your inheritance ceremony is about to come? I daresay we have about three months to make you memorize scripts and scripts of boring speeches, when to react, how to react and the correct behaviour." Hisana gave an evil cackle as Hai's eyes widened.

"Kaa-chan! You never said anything about that!" Hai almost screeched, only reigning in the horror for a tiny fraction before she started to glare at her cackling and grinning mother.

"Oh yes, Hai. We'll start with the tea ceremony."

Giving another murderous glare, Hai tried to run from this horrible situation, sprinting madly towards the other side of the room, only to have her mother catch her by the collar and tut at Hai condescendingly.

Placing teapots and cups in front of Hai, Hisana's smile grew into a grin, and the morning dragged away to the tea ceremony lecture.

* * *

><p><em>...<em>

Hai groaned, cracking her fingers and stretching her aching back, deciding that she would never, ever partake in a tea ceremony with any of her close family members, unless they absolutely demanded her to do it.

The rituals and meanings of the different tea ceremonies all mystified her, but she couldn't do anything in her current predicament but to memorize it like she should do.

Feeling undecidedly grumpy that afternoon, Hai took towards the training grounds, one hand snapping by her side, the other preoccupied with throwing kunai into the boards.

Her legs still couldn't move really well, but after perhaps a month or so when her father deemed her fit to try channelling chakra into her limbs and more than a number of attempts that ended up with her landing solidly on the ground with her bottom and aching legs, a minimal amount of chakra could be injected into her legs and made her move just a little bit better than before.

She tried to work around it, of course. Getting into kunai-throwing position had been so slow and tedious for her when she tried to move her stubby, almost three-year old legs into an appropriate stance. So instead, she tried to learn how to throw kunai with both of her legs standing squarely towards the target board.

On good days, it hit the board, and on bad days, it ended up in someone's body. There was only one instance, when she actually landed the kunai in the inner ring of the target board, and ever since then, she had tried to replicate that day's determination and conviction, only to fail miserably by planting a kunai into an entirely different board then what she had been using.

And now, Hai tried throwing one, and much to her euphoria, it landed on the board. Never mind that it was half hanging off the frame, Hai told herself not to be discouraged. Following a few more throws, Hai's mood notably increased and the small smile on her face turned brighter and brighter, until of course, one kunai strayed from its intended trajectory and course to hit a tree not so far away from her.

Immediately, Hai set out to retrieve it, hoping no one was behind the tree. As she neared, she could pick up snatches of conversation which she had no heard before, when she was at the training ground.

"…-could leave, of course, and they wouldn't do it."

"…-No we can't! Where would we go then, 'En?"

"…-better than being branded with a seal that would control us for the rest of our lives right?! Oh come on 'Kane, would you want to be branded for the rest of your lives?"

A brief, uneasy silence fell on the two members who were talking, Hai observed mildly from her temporary hiding spot, and the feminine voice spoke again.

"How many months do we have until it's here then?"

"A few months, give or take."

Deciding that she had heard enough, Hai stood up from her crouched position, and feeling a tad bit mystified, Hai approached the clump of bushes and spoke up in a quiet voice.

"I don't get what you're talking about."

A rustle of leaves and two blank-faced, shocked Hyuuga children stared up at Hai, fear and distress evident on their faces.

Hai blinked at them. They were not what she had expected for people to be whispering behind bushes.

The female, a small and thin person with loose locks of marine blue hair gaped at her, and the smallest of whimpers ripped itself from her throat. The male, a taller but equally thin male, shook his black hair and stared back at her with animosity, his lips curled into a half-snarl. They couldn't be much older than her, not for children this small.

"So it's the Hyuuga heir," He sneered, standing up rigidly and facing Hai, "it won't be soon before you report us, so why not we give you a good bashing before we leave?"

He glared at Hai, his face twisted into a stone-cold and ferocious mask, his hands outstretched to defend himself.

"'En, don't," the female whispered, squeezing her eyes shut before she stood by the male with conviction in her eyes, a look of rebelliousness painted on her face.

Hai stood there stiffly, and the atmosphere grew thick with tension.

"What do you fear?" Hai asked slowly, and gazed from one face to the other, "What have I done?"

A startled look of surprise flickered over 'En', but he steeled himself and glared at her. "I do not fear anything, Hyuuga heir!"

"Do you really?"

'En' seemed to crumble on the inside, mental walls being torn down as Hai questioned him, staring straight into his eyes. 'Kane' also seemed to crumple a bit, fear poisoning her heart and replacing some of the animosity. Their snarls now held no more of the intense anger, terror had leaked into it as they stared back at her, their bodies slackening and looking smaller than they did a few seconds ago.

"Why do you fear me?" Hai pressed on, unblinking and determined to wrench an answer from them, "Why?"

All anger seemed to leave them completely, the duo looking at the ground with bitter, bitter anger and hatred, and fear. They stared, unable to meet her gaze, as the emotions overwhelmed them.

"Because of the seal," 'Kane' started, whispering in a soft voice, "Because of the caged bird seal that would seal our lives away."

Startled by their answer, and unknowing about the seal, Hai promptly sat down and tried for a different, friendlier approach.

"My name is Hai," She offered as they slowly sat down with her, "and I'm three. I don't understand about this seal thing, would you care to explain?"

…

"My name is Akane," The female- Akane, said with a little trepidation, but after a few minutes to ascertain that Hai wouldn't kill them for wanting to leave the clan, she continued, "And I'm six. We're siblings, me and him."

After a few prods and chidings from Akane, the male finally spoke with a growl, "Name's Enma, I'm seven."

Hai nodded slowly, and snapped her fingers by her side. The siblings gave each other nervous looks, but started to explain about seals.

"Every time a Hyuuga heir turns three-"

"-Or when they inherit the heir position-"

"There's a ceremony to celebrate that-"

"-And all members that have not been marked-"

"-By the caged bird seal will be marked."

They said, ending each other sentences and staring at her with identical looks of bitter feelings.

"Caged bird seal? What does that do?" Hai asked, her brows furrowed in thought as she catalogued it down. Her memories haven't gone to the part where the caged bird seal was introduced, and she had never heard about it before, because clearly, Hai could not recognize any of this.

"All members that are under the age of twelve are marked, and if there are members who will exceed the age of twelve before the next inheritance ceremony is held, they will still be marked by the age of twelve."

"The seal," Enma said, pausing slightly as he fumbled for a word to describe what he was thinking, and finally spoke with raw, powerful anger lacing his voice, "controls us. If the main branch members, like you, want to control us, they use it to cause pain by injecting chakra into the chakra vessels near the brain's nervous system."

"And the seal can never be removed." Akane finished softly, a hard glint in her eye, her head down, staring hardly at the earth beneath their bodies, "It never can, and never will be."

* * *

><p><em>...<em>

"I think it's time you learnt how to fight, Hai." Hiashi commented to his daughter, startling Hai who had been bent low over her books and reading contentedly. Hai stared at him, as if trying to discern the cause for her father to say such things.

"Kaa-chan would be mad," Hai eventually said, her eyes hardening and her face turning into stone, displeased at the thought of anyone going against her mother's wishes, and then she added with an afterthought, "I would be mad too."

Hiashi gazed at his daughter- Reaching the age of three in a few months, and despite her currently small frame, it held a subtle distance to anyone surrounding her. As if she wasn't attached to anyone, anything, and the distant look she had as if she was contemplating something. And he sighed.

"A war is brewing Hai, we need to be prepared. Hisana's displeasure in teaching you how to fight cannot be the thing that leads to your death. As for your concern," Hiashi paused, gazing at Hai thoughtfully, "I'm sure you'll see how this would help you. Your lessons start after the inheritance, I advise you to practice with your new playmates."

Hai stiffened. Hiashi had indeed found out about Enma and Akane, just like Blue and Red had predicted.

"_At least you held it off as long as you could Hai; we knew that it couldn't be a secret forever."_

**We just have to be more careful, now that your father knows. Warn Enma not to talk and rant about the curse seal as much as he does. I'll miss that amusement though.**

"_God, Red. All you can think of is how Enma is amusing when he rants?"_

The Colours whispered to me, and Blue gave an indignant huff as Blue found out about Red gaining amusement from Enma's rants.

Feeling a little better, Hai's stormy expression softened a little, as she smiled inwardly at her colours' antics. Hiashi took one last glance at his daughter, and left the room, sweeping out in a graceful manner.

Left to her own thoughts, Hai wondered how she would break the news to the siblings.

* * *

><p><em>One month left before IC<em>

"No."

"Yes!"

"No."

"Yes."

"_No."_

Enma pouted, and tried to glare at me.

"I refuse to spar with you if you want to add stupid battle shrieks into this session." Hai said solemnly, also glaring at Enma. Akane sighed and shook her head.

"You're no fun Hai, right Akane, right?" Enma asked his sister, earnestly bobbing his head up and down at Akane to get her to agree.

In the following weeks after meeting the siblings behind the bushes, Hai had slowly opened up to them, and the sessions of 'boring book reading' as Enma called it, had progressed further into Hai asking for sparring sessions between the three of them.

At first, Hai like the reticent and unsociable hermit she described herself to be, had sat apart with Akane and read a book, smiling and nodding politely whenever Enma had gone on one of his rants. Enma, and perhaps Akane to a degree, had found her behaviour unacceptable for one of the 'Three Awesome Ninjas!' as Enma had again named them, and started to prod the unwilling Hyuuga heir into interacting more with them.

(Why they ever made friends with her was still a mystery to Hai, for she had never remembered telling them that she actually wanted to interact with them again. When asked a month later when Hai was feeling particularly curious, Enma confessed that he never actually thought that the Hyuuga heir would talk to them and be the 'Ice princess' his cousins often spoke about. After all, it had been her who initiated the conversation when they first met.)

Each day Enma had tried to annoy Hai into screaming at him, snickering at the mental imagery of Hai with her forest green hair in a mess and shrieking at him for putting frogs in her shirt.

When executing the plan, however, Enma always mysteriously tripped and the frog landed up in his own pants.

That only happened when Akane and Hai felt pissed, a common emotion they felt when Enma started pranking them when they both eventually accepted each other to quietly read books under the big oak tree's shade in each other's vicinity.

(A victory, Akane said many weeks later, for Hai finally sat near her, their bodies pressed together while they read various interesting books while Enma went about trying to elicit responses from the both of them.)

And so, their unwilling one-sided friendship began to progress further. Hai told the both of them one day, in a quiet tone, that she would like to begin to explore the sprawling forest that grew behind the Hyuuga clan compound a few hundred metres behind with them, and Enma had exploded in happiness as much as a Hyuuga could. Even Akane, a person almost at quiet as Hai was, laughed and clapped Hai on the back.

They had ventured into the forest, Enma and Akane was familiar with most of the forest and Hai, stumbling after them as much as her stiff, short legs would allow gaped in wonder at the gigantic trees that sprouted up like grass in that area.

The siblings grinned at her stunned expression, and ran ahead of her, egging her on to move on, move faster Hai. Passing through greenery and leaping through thick tree roots and dodging trees while running at her full speed made Hai feel inexplicably and exhilaratingly happy.

It was like a stream, the joy rushed into her as she ran free in the woods, slightly behind the siblings but grinning madly. Her lungs would heave and the air would sting them and the cold, sharp smell of the trees and the soil and the air and the clouds and the plants hung in the forest, nothing like the rooms she slept in or ate in or did anything in.

Her legs would not comply from the beginning, they made her trip and stumble and fall, but running through the forest and following the siblings made them listen, made them obey so Hai could run and dash and leap and sprint, so the stiffness disappeared for a few sweet moments, and reappeared again when she slowed down.

Eventually, they stopped. Akane and Enma stopped under a large oak tree, the siblings barely out of breath and Hai panting heavily, unused to such activities. The siblings whirled around in unison, and looked at her expectantly, and Hai broke into a large smile.

"It's awesome." The moment she said that, Akane and Enma grinned at each other and flopped down onto the ground beside her, and for a moment, they fall into silence.

Enma doesn't scream, rant or yell. Akane doesn't scold Enma, or talks to Hai. And Hai doesn't respond with monosyllables like she does.

They fall into a silence, into a trance as they sat there, exhausted and appreciative of this comfortable silence.

And after a few minutes, Enma breaks the trance.

"You're finally one of the Three Awesome Ninja!"

Hai sighs, and Akane shakes her head.

"I find your taste of names lacking, Enma." Hai said, and Akane agreed.

"How about Better-than-Hokage Ninjas?" Enma suggested, scratching his head with one hand.

"Wouldn't that mean that all of us are Hokage? That doesn't make sense." Akane quipped.

"We could just go with Evil lords of doom," Hai adds in with a slight smile, and it grew larger when the siblings stare at her.

"I think we have something there Hai," Akane says, thoughtful, "We could name ourselves Demonic lords or something."

Enma nodded enthusiastically, "How about we call ourselves Lords of Evil?"

"That's like my name, 'cept its reversed. I like it though, and when we talk to others, we can just refer to ourselves as The Lords. Nice and simple-"

"And evil too." Akan adds as an afterthought, and smiles.

"_I refuse to acknowledge that you just decided to call our group The Lords of Evil."_

**Lighten up, the brat finally opened herself up to others, although I gotta admit that The Lords of Evil is pretty terrible.**

_You guys will eventually submit to the Lords of Evil, and your fate is forever cursed._

**And just because you are a Lord of Evil I'll create my own Lord of Good and counter your evil-ness. **

"_Are we seriously having this conversation now?"_

_No, it's just your imagination._

"I think she became a hermit again," Enma whispered-not-so-loudly to Akane, snapping me out of my mind.

"I think I became," Hai paused, and felt conflicted, "too evil, I can't seem to stop plotting your death."

"You did not just say that," Enma gasped, and swatted at me, and Hai scowled at him slightly, just a small frown gracing her face.

"Guys, guys, we all know I'm the evillest lord of all time, you don't need to kill each other over that," Akane finally sighed and butted it with a lazy wave of the hand, "Besides, we should celebrate Hai's first ever run in this forest. So who's up for dango? Our mother makes the best dango ever."

* * *

><p><em><strong>...<strong>_

Night fell, the celebration that took place in Akane and Enma's shared bedroom had ended and all three children had changed and gone home with whispered promises made.

Hai couldn't get rid of the small smile that remained on her face for a long time after that, despite her many attempts at calming herself down and pushing the euphoria of finally having friends, for finally having people who would accept her and talk to her and bring her to their forest and make it _theirs, _for people who didn't mind not knowing all her secrets and memories and felt okay with her not talking as much as they would have liked to.

It faded only when she slipped into her bed, and stared up at the ceiling, slowly feeling sleep snatching her from the living world and into another world- The world of memories, of people she did not know, of people she had never seen before, of people that despite her not being attached to, whose deaths plague her dreams, whose happy laughter and sorrowful, solemn moments fill her head while she sleeps, of people that makes another world entirely.

(And for a moment, Hai wonders whether she belonged in the living world, whether Akane and Enma were real, and perhaps the world where the sleepy, once murky and now crystal clear memories dwell was actually where she belongs, and Akane and Enma no more than memories.

She wonders about the place she truly, _truly _belongs to, and finds a great shadow hanging over her, and then she pushes these thoughts away, shuts her eyes and lets sleep pull her away from the world of the living. And perhaps, she would find her place to belong in these dark, swirling memories. )

It hurts, not knowing where to belong. It kills Hai inside, because under the feverish dreams and replays of the memories, she can feel something deeper; A feeling pulls her to a particular memory, one that she tries so hard- despite not knowing why- to avoid, conviction that this memory would kill her once and for all, something that would do what the others cannot do.

She doesn't know what to do, whether the living world is real, whether the dream world is real, because she _just doesn't belong. _

She had never belonged.

Taking a deep breath inside this dream world, and letting the grins and happiness she felt from being with Akane and Enma tide over her, wishing that someone above would look out for her, and then stares determinedly at the scene in front of her.

Because she won't submit quietly to the yawning gap inside her; She would train harder, physically and emotionally to overcome this, to find what she needs and finally become whole again.

Because she just can't let herself go anymore.

* * *

><p><em>Extra:<em>

"Perhaps we should change our name." Hai tried when the three of them were lying under the oak tree in various states of undress. Enma had thrown all of his clothes in a huge messy pile beside him, leaving only his pants on.

"I suggest something _nicer. _Like Rainbow for example." Hai suggested, trying to draw out responses from the two of them. When they didn't respond, she felt her eyebrows go up, and finally ended with, "I'll take silence as consent then."

With one happier-than-normal Hai in tow, the name was thus set in stone.

_Rainbow._


	3. Chapter 3

_Summary: Just thinking of her memories made her head hurt- What more could she ask for? OC_

_Followers: B. , ItrulyDoNotCare, Morietachibana, Musical Bear, eightbitowl, kimchi759, moonligh, niteshine, the Hate child _

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_..._

* * *

><p><em><em>_**LINE**_

* * *

><p>Hai was in the forest again, alone, because Enma and Akane aren't back from their lecture and punishment that they had received just over an hour ago.<p>

Inhaling deeply, trying to calm her rapidly beating heart, to soothe her fears and rising excitement, Hai focused on what they had done an hour before.

The run in the forest was just as exhilarating; Her leaps had gotten more powerful, and she didn't stumble as much. She didn't trip or fall flat on her face, and that, she thought with a small upturn of her lips, something passable for a smile, was something _great_. For all her life, all she ever felt was the stiff, tight wounding of her tendons and her muscles in her legs, in her arms, that tired feeling she could never shake off, even when she woke up during the morning.

She had thought she had accepted that lethargy, that fact that she will never have the ability to run as fast or jump as fast as her counterparts on an equal standing, nor will she ever react as fast, but on days where it was so painfully reminded to her when she had to try to invent an entire new stance to throw her senbon, or her kunai, she would try hard, so desperately hard that it hurt inside, to let tears stain her face, to let it drip down steadily onto her shirt.

And she would fail, on toughest of days. She would sit there, staring blankly at the ceiling while her inner mind was in turmoil, while she was screaming in frustration inside, when the fear of being weak- too weak to keep her precious people safe, too weak to survive, _to belong_, and the tears would flow. But she would never, _never,_ tell her mother, or her father, or anyone else she had trouble.

No, not when they had enough on their minds, not when they think her condition is improving despite the fact that it's getting _worse_, that it's not healing _at all_, that it burns and hurts and wrenches when Hai can't take it. They must not know, not be aware of it, when there is war on the doorstep, when one extra burden will get them killed, where it will get her killed. They cannot worry, because even though Hai feels that she still does not belong, still does not talk, breathe and act like one of them, and deep inside feels that this will never be _home_, this is still the closest it will be right now, that the smiles and laughter and joy cannot disappear, not now, not when Hai is just beginning to feel like she belongs, when it will never be the same if they stop being them.

But this- This makes her feel so much more powerful; she runs and leaps and twists out of the way so much more nimbly than before, so much more fast and just so much more flexibly. It gives her a small comfort, to know that at least she can push her body to its limits and beyond in the large forest, to know that she can at least try to improve in these few years before her condition gets worse, before the stiffness grows and completely makes her stand still again. But she knows that eventually, that will come, and tries hard not to think about it, tries hard not to think how she'll be so _vulnerable _when she's completely immobile.

A rustle of leaves, almost silent but just enough that Hai can hear it through the thrum and lively vibrations of life in the old forest and all its trees and birds and plants and animals, announces Akane's arrival. A louder, brasher and a little slower set of footsteps follow Akane's, and Enma grins at Hai.

Both of them sits down next to her (Enma just flops over lazily while Akane is refined when she sits down. Hai wonders briefly how the siblings managed to differ so much in personality and character, and then backtracks, because she sees similar if not identical conviction in the both of them, sees their determination and their strength, sees their common goal of trying to bring equality to the Branch house despite not being aware of it. And Hai vows seriously to herself, that if she ever survived to succeed her father's position, she would aid them in their cause.), and they sit there, contented if not a bit tired because the siblings have just finished mopping the floors after Enma trekked into the rooms with his feet stained with black mud and sludge.

Hai watches them trade snide remarks and sarcasm, and thinks to herself that she wants this kind of kinship, she wants someone to be able to belong with, to be able to_ make them belong, _to get what she always wanted, and what she is still wanting.

They sync with each other, each knows the other, and their bond runs so deep that even scarring remarks and burning comments do not affect them- They were merely treated as side comments, as jokes. They belong with each other, Hai thinks, my place is not here.

Suddenly, an arm is slung around her shoulders casually, a few warm laughs exchanged, two pairs of slightly concerned eyes staring at her, creases in their faces and a small hand rested on her forehead. Hai blinks, and stares blankly at Akane, who remarks, "I don't think she has a fever. I think she caught your stupidity."

Enma scowls at her, and Hai follows suit. But there is no ill intent underneath, because despite their strong bond and unshakable trust in each other, Akane and Enma has another different bond with Hai, a weaker one than between both of them, but unique in its own right, and well on the way to be just shy of their kinship. And Hai is only aware of a fraction of the bond, but enough that she knows that she will belong with the both of them.

Maybe, _just maybe, _that bond would be able to hold her here.

* * *

><p>:DDDD<p>

* * *

><p>Late during the afternoon, Hisana watches her daughter come back home, not limping or dragging her feet like her body usually does because it can't get better, but smiling faintly and gazing at the two little branch house members with deep fondness and a mysterious, puzzled expression in her eyes, and walking. Walking normally like all the other children do, walking as if she were one of the siblings.<p>

Hisana smiles, but feels a great tugging inside, because despite the masks and the layers her daughter has covered and buried herself in, Hisana can still sense the loneliness and the longing that calls out, that screams to her, and inside she aches for her child, aches because her child is hurting and she can't stop it.

She knows her daughter can never have a normal childhood, like all the clan heirs and children of the Hyuuga clan never could have. And this happiness and relieve that her daughter has finally found someone, or _two _someones, to belong with, bubbles and swirls inside her.

But the children would eventually leave, broken and torn up by the fate that they will encounter, the branding of their foreheads with the Caged Bird seal, a fate she herself had encountered. All she can do is to hope for the best, hope that their relationship will run deep enough, that the inheritance ceremony the next week will not tear the three apart.

The cracks outside of her small family have seemed to heal, but the rawest, deepest wounds have not stopped festering.

_**LINE**_

"So you won't leave?" She said, almost whispering, plaintively.

"No, not now, not ever. You never leave if you have a family member behind, right?"

"Especially not if she needs us back here right?"

Her reply couldn't be heard audibly, but all three of them know what she would say, and didn't need to hear it, because it didn't matter much.

…

_Why do I have so much Yin chakra? _

The question rung in her head, because day after day after week after month, Hai had tried and tried to climb a tree using her feet, but the tree only grew healthier and greener before she was rejected; Pushed away by the natural chakra of the tree and expelled.

It normally ended with Hai on the ground, bruised, and sometimes bleeding.

It had happened with the leaf exercise before- Hai had only used what she felt was the least amount, making sure that the leaf only grew and didn't explode from chakra overdose.

She could only scale half of the big oak tree the siblings and herself used as their hide out and dwelling place before she was pushed away from the bark.

Hai was sitting beneath its shade now, trying hard to puzzle out this particular deficiency of hers.

"_Because of us."_

Startled from the sudden reply, Hai almost fell over the protruding root she had been sitting on, managing to steady herself just before her face hit the root. Just inches away from the root, Hai saw a faint dark purple glow around her, and the little plants that had been growing on the root sprouted up and continued to shoot up for a few centimetres, until the Hai could no longer see her purple aura again.

Sitting up properly, she started to question the colours inside her mind again.

_What was that?_

**Your excess of Yin chakra mixed with your Yang chakra. Normally, your glow would be purple, but since your Yin chakra is blue and you have an excess of that, your aura turns a deep purple.**

"_The opposite of you would be the Uzumaki. Uzumaki are famous for their excessive Yang chakra, or what it represents- vitality. You have an excess of spiritual chakra. Normally, this spiritual chakra is used to heal from the inside, while the vitality chakra is used to heal from the outside."_

**And we believe that your yin chakra manifested… into us. **

_What?_

Hai said in disbelief. The other parts made sense, but Hai still didn't know why she had so much yin chakra. Hearing the last sentence, however, was somewhat… surprising and unsurprising for her. Hai knew that probably no one else would have the same occurrence of having disembodied voices talking to them inside the head, and had worried that it was a sign of her going insane, just like her having memories of unknown people.

This revelation cleared up things a little, and Hai could feel relief pouring into her.

**You know that you don't really… **_**belong **_**here, do you? We've told you about how we think that you are from another world. What I think that happened was that your soul was put into a normal body that had its own balance of Yin and Yang chakra, but your soul's spiritual energy added to this body. Given that, there will be an imbalance of chakra here.**

"_And so, all of your extra spiritual energy would disrupt a normal infant's development, and probably kill you at such a young age while your internal organs are still developing. We think that in order to prevent itself from self-destructing, your body made your extra yin chakra manifest into both of us, spiritual voices without a physical body. Perhaps… perhaps we'll fade in time, but right now we're sentient beings borne from your spiritual power."_

**We think that we can just, go back into your soul. You're using both our chakra at the same time you're using yours, so when you retract us, the chakra is stored some place inside your body, and your chakra level will stop being so imbalanced. Over time, we might return, but we aren't really sure about that. We might just disappear, and never return again. **

"_The second way to combat your solution, is of course to use your yin chakra to do something other than power whatever you're doing. We don't really know, but if you try to use your excess yin chakra to coat your upper legs instead of putting it on the sole of your feet you might just be able to climb up the tree."_

_That's… surprisingly complex and detailed. Yet it seems so simply. I don't think I want to do the retracting quite just yet, I don't want to lose you colours. I'll try the coating thing._

Inhaling deeply, Hai focused on drawing her chakra out and coating her feet with them. Her feet turned a dark purple, but Hai didn't notice. Her eyes were screwed shut and her mind deep in concentration.

Drawing yin chakra from the massive amount of chakra pooled around her feet, Hai reflected, was not that easy. She had tried doing it consciously, but she couldn't feel the familiar tingle of chakra around her legs.

Trying harder this time, and with advice from the colours to draw out the 'soul' from her chakra, she felt her feet getting warmer and her legs getting colder, and the dark purple around her legs started to slowly change into purple, and her legs started to take on a bluish sheen.

And then her vision turned bloody, before it turned dark again.

_**LINE**_

"-awake, sir." A nervous sounding voice squeaked out from somewhere above her, followed by a huge wave of nausea that left her shutting her eyes and wishing that the _damn _world would stop spinning.

Two faces appeared in her vision when she finally decided to try opening her eyes again, and they looked… eerily similar to her father's.

A look of disapproval and disappointment flashed on one of the faces, but concern and kind bemusement appeared on the other.

"Fatzhers…? 'hy do 'ou look zo deevrent?" Hai slurred out, trying to ignore her throbbing head and the emptiness of her stomach.

One of her father's head chuckled softly.

"I'm not your father, Hai. I'm your uncle." He said good-naturedly, effectively freaking Hai out, because as far as she knew, her father did not chuckle in such a manner.

Hell, her father only smiled and laughed, never did he ever chuckle.

"Zhwat?" Hai stared confusedly between the both of them, her headache growing worse.

"He's your uncle." Hiashi confirmed stiffly, nodding towards his brother, "He's my twin."

Hai felt a sharp pain in her stomach before she passed out again.

…

"Haaaaaiiii~" Hai groaned. Only one person could make her name sound so sickeningly sweet, and that person should never be allowed within a kilometre's range of her when she had some kind of illness.

"Enma," Hai acknowledged, before spotting the quieter but no less protective sibling of Enma's, "Akane too."

"What were you thinking?" Akane hissed, pushing her brother out of the way to glower angrily at Hai, "Your fucking inheritance ceremony is in a week and you want to use up all of your damn chakra and poison yourself from the outside? You can't expose your weak side when so many people are going to come and congratulate you. What about the assassins? The kidnappers? God, Hai, you're a fucker!"

She tried to piece through what Akane said, her head still spinning. Then, slightly giddy, she said, "Akane swore. Akane swore in public. Akane the quiet and less reckless sibling _swore._"

A fit of delirious giggles emitted from Hai's mouth, and she could blearily see Akane's face getting red from either anger or embarrassment, probably a mixture of both.

"I like you better when you're half-dead." Enma choked out from his own fit of laughter, "You always say stupid things."

"Here I am, being all protective and you only notice my usage of swear words Hai," Akane groaned, but her lips tugged into a small smile.

As information started to flow into her brain, Hai went over what Akane said again and noted with some confusion the usage of 'chakra poisoning'. She stared quizzically into space, effectively missing out the bemused stares from the siblings.

"Earth to Hai, earth to Hai, do you hear me?" Enma waved a hand in front of Hai's unblinking eyes, and smirked as she jolted upright with a stiff groan.

"Looks like the normal Hai is back again," Akane sighed as she sat next to Hai's bed, "You want to know why you fainter right?"

Hai stared at Akane, her mouth slightly opened.

"How did I know? I'm your friend Hai, heck; I'm one of your two friends. Do you want to know why you were poisoned?"

And then Akane started to explain, with several pieces of information jabbed in by Enma.

Apparently, Hai had drawn too much of her chakra outside of her still growing chakra coils and pooled it outside in her feet. As the chakra was pulled outside and manifested physically, they started to get influenced by outside factors other than her body.

In other words, Hai's chakra was becoming 'less pure' as it was pulled outside, than compared to its natural state inside her body. It was affected by heat, humidity, and her surroundings. By the time Hai could draw the Yin part of her chakra exposed to the outside of her body, it had become tainted and impure.

As her body drew too much chakra out, it tried to reach for the nearest part of her chakra source available in order to stop itself from becoming vulnerable through fatigue and chakra exhaustion, snatching the yin chakra from outside and absorbing it inside.

And then naturally, her body got poisoned, of course.

Her body couldn't utilise this chakra it had drawn in since it had become a foreign entity, and instead tried to expel it using its already severely limited chakra, and those that did not get expelled spread through her chakra network like wildfire and making the body attack itself from the inside.

"That's about it, really." Enma said as Akane grew breathless from her lengthy explanation, and glared again at Hai for good measure, "Never, ever, do that again, you understand?"

Hai turned slightly pale as both siblings looked evilly at her, and nodded hastily. Then remembering another pressing issue that plagued her for a few hours, Hai asked the siblings something again.

"Say, do you know of my father's doppelganger?"

The siblings gave each other odd looks, when a smooth sliding of the door interrupted their answer.

"Ah, out of danger and you're already talking about me. It's nice to see that I'm famous around here."

Hai stared at the newcomer who strode in through the door, and found herself face to face with a man looking so identical to her father, except for a few mischievous and playful wrinkles and curves around his eyes and mouth, the only things that differentiated from her father.

The man crinkled his eyes in amusement and gave the siblings a short nod. Turning to Hai, he smiled conspiringly.

"Nice to meet you, Hai, I'm your father's twin and your uncle, Hizashi."

…

"Do you think I can poison someone with it?"

Hisana looked at the hopeful and cheerful look on Hai's normally stone-like face, the childish curiosity showing through and cheered inwardly, because even as Hai's mother, she doesn't see anything remotely childlike show up with Hai.

Even when it's something potentially lethal and life-taking that Hai's talking about, Hisana doesn't mind it at all, because as long as Hai's happy, she's happy.

Hisana fell to the floor, leaning her head with one hand and staring at the ceiling, going through the information Hai gave her. Biting her lip, she answered, "It's possible, but not very practical. You'll have to get a good amount out and force it inside a person's system in order for them to be poisoned. You only passed out because you used too much chakra and the tainted chakra was a large amount."

Hai seemed to drift off into space, although she was still sitting uprightly and properly as an heir of the Hyuuga clan should, but the distant look on her silver eyes gave her sand-castle building in the air away.

"Hai, what did the medics say?" Hisana narrowed her eyes and sat up as she recognized her daughter's eyes gleaming whenever Hai was thinking of experimenting using her chakra. "_Hai," _Hisana admonished as she uncourteously bashed her fist over her daughter's head, ignoring the reflexive yelp that hadn't quite been learnt to fully subdue yet.

"Yes, Kaa-san," Hai dutifully said, willing her hands to not cover her head and ended up with a twitch, something she had accomplished a few weeks ago.

"The idea of it has plenty of potential, just that you have to have plenty of chakra reserves before actually pulling it off. Either that, or you have to figure out a way of making a small amount of chakra affect the system really well, like say, poison that can be saturated into chakra. The normal Gentle Fist Style usually uses an amount of chakra that can easily damage the nerves around the tenketsu point you're aiming at, but you can try to use a smaller amount to make it more efficient. But it's not really possible, and you better not try it out Hai. Not until you're at least five and well-grounded in the Gentle Fist style that you're only going to learn after you turn four."

Hisana groaned when she saw Hai's hopeful puppy dog eyes, and willed herself not to crumble to insane and overly curious not-quite-yet three year olds.

…

The inheritance ceremony goes smoothly, which was expected after months and weeks' worth of planning, and tired people with irritable attitudes.

But it was also a time, for the Hyuuga clan to proclaim about their heir, about how strong the clan was and is, and how they would continue their bloodline.

Hai was a little sick by then, because despite the faint inkling of knowning that ceremonies like this was generally stuffy and horrible, she didn't think that this much emotional manipulation was put into a ceremony like this.

Clans had to attend because the Hyuuga were one of the biggest clans, and not turning up would destroy their reputation and their livelihood, seeing that the Hyuuga owned a multitude of businesses and companies, and boycotting a minor family would be easy, not to mention a bigger one like the Naras, just that the difficulty would increase.

The clans would have to offer the Hyuugas some kind of contract or deal as a present, because this event was being paraded off as something crucial, something important. In order to gain the Hyuuga's good will and favour, they had to carve out something and present it.

That basically made this entire thing into a rat race, and some weren't able to survive this.

Not to mention the Elders trying to play the Hyuuga clan off as something vital to Konoha- without it Konoha would practically fall from the sheer manpower loss and the profits it brought it.

Hai was quite thoroughly done with the entire thing, but for all of the three years (and isn't that funny? Hai felt older, as tired as a twenty-something year old. Weird, or was this just a part of her?), she couldn't bear to see the branch house members being branded at the end of the day. Seeing Enma and Akane at the end of it was even worse, and despite knowing that they were both, strong people and almost invincible ones at that, the red rims around their eyes and the bandage stood out so glaringly to Hai.

The animosity from the children being branded was there, and despite it being muted it was still, _still _there, a raging surge of anger and horror painting her surroundings a dull gray. Her heart twinged slightly, because these were her family, these were the people she would be growing up with. And branding them… she would have to do that to their children one day.

Wincing slightly to herself and nervously snapping her fingers, Hai could only wait for the day to end.

…

Hiashi walked in, back straight and hands rigid at his sides, to check up on his daughter. She hadn't shown much outward emotion at the ceremony, something that he was unsure about whether it was a good or bad thing, something to be proud of, or something to be worried about. But he would confess, that he had the slight discomfort in his gut that something was happening, and peeked his head into the room.

Quiet snuffles could be heard, but nothing Hiashi would have known about had he not strained his ears. Hai's form was nearly still, but she was curled up in a fetal-like position, where he could hear almost-silent gasping, and froze a little.

Activating his Byakugan, Hiashi worriedly checked (or as worriedly as he could. He shouldn't show too much emotion, but… wasn't it appropriate for a parent to do so in front of his child?) up on Hai, and saw her… crying.

Her fists were balled up, and she tried to curl in as much as possible in a comfortable position. They slid down her eyes, resting on her flushed cheeks, before slipping down onto a puddle of water below her. There was grief, untamed and unrestrained, pouring out and gushing and washing around her, and Hiashi could see a tiny, purple tinge surrounding her small frame, which he wouldn't see if he weren't looking with Byakugan. Chakra aura, he decided, still standing rather awkwardly at the doorframe.

Sighing, he walked in stiffly, and recalled how his grandmother used to comfort him as a child. He walked towards the door, intentionally making his footsteps louder than it usually was (ninjas didn't walk with sound, it didn't go hand in hand for a killer) and sitting by the side. The doors were open and the moon shining bright, Hiashi's voice was low and rough but it was still gentle enough for it to sound welcoming.

"Hai, come here."

Hai seemed to be shocked, before she slowly scrambled out and forced out a 'yes, father'.

At a loss for what else to do, Hiashi remembered one of his favourite stories, and began to tell her.

"Hai, my child, do you see the moon? My grandmother used to tell me a story, when I was little but not as small as you. I had nightmares back then, where my brother and I were both forced to kill each other after everyone else around us had died. The moon in that dream was always red. My grandmother told me that the moon was a symbol of gentle beings, of being strong-spirited yet kind and compassionate. There was once a pair of brothers, and they were strong, stubborn and yet, compassionate. They were thought to be the sun, and the moon, in a time where both of them stayed in the sky, a half of the land was sunny and the other half cooling, and they swapped positions every day.

Both of them were happy- the work of switching and giving to the lesser mortals under them was not to be thought of as easy, but it was satisfying in a way.

Until came an individual, and it was called the Great Divider. Because over the years, Sun and Moon had mixed together, giving uneven sunlight, or uneven darkness, and the effects of it slowly brought the mortals to waste. From one of the murkier, more blended areas came the Divider, and each brother saw a different person in the Divider. The sun saw a lovely woman, stubborn and strong as he was and educated, while Moon saw a man, an educated, gentle being that loved Nature. They warred over the Divider, and who got to love them.

Each of them fell in love, and because of the Divider, the world fell into chaos. In order to make the mortals suffer less, the great Emperor decided to split them up, split the pair of brothers so that there wouldn't be anymore havoc. Divider became the bond that the brothers eventually communicate through, since for twelve hours one brother stayed, and the other twelve the other brother replaced."

Hiashi sighed, and gave Hai a fond wistful half-smile.

"Eventually, both brothers died, and reunited in another place. It is said that a pair of twins would be born almost every generation with great destiny in their hands, rarely only two different children become one like a pair of twins. Our clan was thought to have taken up their legacy, with the Sun in our names and the moonlight in our eyes, where we watch and are all-seeing. But with that comes great burden, and just like the Divider, emotions can be the downfall of us, but can also make us breakthrough, making, shaping us into a being like we had never been. The story helped me sleep, because despite knowing that one day I would be seperated, when we leave this realm we would be together.

Hai, my child, let your fears go. It is okay to have emotion, it is okay to make mistakes. The Sun and Moon did the same thing, and yet they reconciled. It's okay, Hai, it's okay."

Hai stared at her father, and the tears that gathered at her eyes were hastily wiped with her sleeve.

Hiashi got up, and dusted himself.

"Hai, sleep, it's a long way ahead before your time ends."


End file.
